Samael wrote:
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Michael Lorrey <mike@lorrey.com>
> To: extropians@extropy.com <extropians@extropy.com>
> Date: 11 December 1998 15:20
> Subject: Re: The Education Function
>
> >Samael wrote:
> >
> >THe funny thing is that the more socialist a country is, the more people
> who
> >fall off the bottom and stay in the poverty class. Since taxation adds an
> >incredible amount to an individual's cost of living, it follows that in a
> high
> >tax socialist environment, more people will fall below the poverty level
> because
> >the measured 'market basket' of goods and services is inflated by those
> high
> >taxes at all levels of production and distribution.
>
> Except for those people who have no useful skills, who have no means of
> getting money. They will be better off once they recieve training and are
> helped into work. 60% extra nothing is still nothing.
>
> Example (albeit a personal one). My Girlfriend was recently diagnosed as
> schizophrenic.
How old is she and was she insured before she was diagnosed?
> She spent apporximately 2 years in and out of hospitals and
> is now on drugs which help most of the time. With help and time she'll be
> able to get herself back into society and earn a living (which should
> include paying off the money spent on her by the health service). She had
> no money and still has none. She will have eventually (once she is better).
> In a pure capiutalist society she would have starved to death by now.
Hardly. Considering that the evidence shows that the more capitalist a country is, the amount of private charity work increases markedly. Look at the recent example of the evil Mr Gates and wife, who just donated $100 million to vaccinate children around the world. Of of Ted Turner, who is funnelling $1 billion toward various UN programs, most of which are health related. One of the interesting things about private charitable organizations is that they do their work more efficiently than similar government run organizations. A greater percentage of dollars spent is used in the field on the end result with private giving than with public welfare. Few people outside the US know that Americans donate a larger percentage of their incomes to private charity work than any other country in the world.
I've also had a personal taste of the welfare state, sir, which I one reason I will celebrate its downfall. Almost ten years ago when I left the Air Force to pursue a job at Boeing just before the Gulf War, I wound up jilted from the job offer and unemployed in Seattle, homeless. I was unable to collect any government assistance or unemployment compensation mainly because I was an able bodied, male, white, straight individual. I didn't fit into any of their predefined groups of 'victims', so I was SOL. Besides that, the Air Force and the VA manipulated my pay records in order to deny me my GI Bill benefits for college. Just so you don't think that was an isolated incident, two years ago when I was unemployed, I also applied for unemployment, but was also denied in that case, not because I was ineligible, but they always found loopholes and excuses to deny me benefits every two weeks. I doubt that there will be many people happier than I when the whole system crashes on the eve of the millenium.... Now I won't make the same mistake again. I work as a contract worker, so I pay no unemployment insurance. I can write all of my technology related expenses off, as well as travel and meal costs, and even though some tough things have happened to me this year (I blew the engine in my Jeep twice, as well as had to replace the gas tank, the radiator, the exhaust, the air conditioning and a couple other minor things) I have been able to cover them all while maintaining a rather comfortable life. I have not received one cent from the government for anything since I left the Air Force in 1990, despite some real crises and problems.
>
>
> >Yes there will still be people who fall off the bottom of the system,
> people
> >become drunks, drug addicts, or suffer accidents without sufficient
> insurance,
> >or are dependents of people who do so. That, sir, is life.
>
> It is life for you. It is not life for me. And I shall remain in a country
> where it is not life. And lobby for it to be life everywhere, becasue to do
> anything else would be to stop caring.
Again, hardly. I want a choice in what to care for. I dont care what you care for, and I don't want to pay for what you care for. I will pay as much or as little as I want for what I want to care for. At this point, all the people out there yelling 'GIMMEEE' just makes me want to put people in general way far down on my list of things to care about.
> Now, if we could cure
> >everyone who has predispositions toward drug and alcohol abuse I think that
> >would go a long way toward ending this problem, since most poverty and
> crime is
> >drug and alcohol related.
>
> Most drug related crime is caused by the regulation of said drugs. This
> much was learnt from prohibition.
Since alcohol is freely available to anyone over 21, yet 80% of all traffic related injuries and deaths are caused by drunk driving, then I don't think that regulation has much to do with it.
A question though: Since you obviously learned a lesson from Prohibition, that government regulation to prevent people from doing something which hurts nobody, why can't you figure out that since even the poorest working people in a capitalist country like here are far wealthier than even some of the middle classes in most heavy socialist countries, using government regulation to prevent people from being economically effective is a dumb idea too...?